Sunday, July 31, 2011
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011
By the end of the 1990s, the federal budget was in surplus for the first time in decades. Partly that was a product of unusually strong economic growth, during the internet boom, which had swelled tax revenues. But partly that was a product of responsible budgeting, presided over by the most recent two presidents, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. In order to reduce deficits, lawmakers and those two presidents had agreed both to raise taxes and to reduce spending.
In the 2000 campaign, Clinton's would-be successor, Al Gore, campaigned on a promise to, in effect, put those surpluses aside for a rainy day. Bush would have none of it. The government had too much money, he said; the responsible thing was to give it all back to the taxpayers. In office, he did just that, presiding over massive tax cuts that gave, by far, the largest benefits to the very wealthy. Bush promised that the tax cuts would act like a "fiscal straightjacket," preventing government from growing. But then he, and his allies, launched two major wars and enacted a drug benefit for Medicare, all without paying for them.
Today's fiscal gap is largely a product of those decisions, as the graph above shows. It has very little to do with anything Obama did while in office. In fact, the contrast between the two administrations could not be more striking. Obama's primary undertaking has been comprehensive health care reform. But he insisted that it pay for itself, through a combination of spending cuts and tax increases.
Click the picture for the entire article.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Monday, July 25, 2011
Via Flickr:
Hogwarts, Hogwarts, hoggy warty Hogwarts,
Teach us something please,
Whether we be old and bald,
Or young with scabby knees,
Our heads could do with filling,
With some interesting stuff,
For now they're bare and full of air,
Dead flies and bits of fluff,
So teach us things worth knowing,
Bring back what we've forgot,
Just do your best, we'll do the rest,
And learn until our brains all rot.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
This is a Penrose Triangle, a geometric figure impossible to reproduce in a tri-dimensional space. It was first created by the Swedish artist Oscar Reutersvard in 1934. Mathemetician Roger Penrose popularized it in the 1950's, describing it as "impossibility in its purest from."
Life of Pi by Yann MartelMeow
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Monday, July 4, 2011
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Via Flickr:
Ganden Monastery (also Gaden or Gandain) or Ganden Namgyeling is one of the 'great three' Gelukpa university monasteries of Tibet, located at the top of Wangbur Mountain, Tagtse County, 36 kilometers ENE from the Potala Palace in Lhasa, at an altitude of 4,750m. (The other two 'great monasteries' are Sera Monastery and Drepung Monastery.)
Its full name is Ganden Namgyal Ling (dga'-ldan rmam-rgyal gling). Ganden means "joyful" and is the Tibetan name for Tuṣita, the heaven where the bodhisattva Maitreya is said to reside. Namgyal Ling means "victorious temple".
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganden_monastery
